Author: Jo Sun

Hi, I'm Jo, ​and I'm a Ph.D. Candidate, I'm working on a project on dementia enabling design. I am very passionate about working towards improving the care of people with dementia, and I hope my work will make a difference. I also love cooking, reading, writing, noms and hugs! I also tweet, blog and run a free e-newspaper in dementia care for the Asian community www.dementiacareasia.com

News Release
April 2019 | University College London, Gower Street, London – Dementia more preventable in Asia and Latin America

Close to one in two cases of dementia could be preventable in low- to middle-income countries, finds a new UCL study.

Dancing in Peru
The findings, published in The Lancet Global Health, found how improving childhood education and other health outcomes throughout life could reduce the risk of dementia.

“After our previous research finding that one in three cases of dementia could be preventable, we realised that the evidence was skewed towards higher-income countries,” said the study’s lead author, Dr Naaheed Mukadam (UCL Psychiatry).

“We have now found that in low- to middle-income countries in Asia and Latin America, dementia may be even more preventable than it is in more wealthy countries. If life-course risk factors such as low levels of education in early life and hearing loss, obesity and low physical activity in mid-life to old age are addressed, these countries could see large improvements in their dementia rates.”

While the number of people with dementia is increasing globally, particularly in low- to middle-income countries, there have been modest reductions in age-specific dementia rates in many high-income countries over the last two decades.* The researchers say this could be due to improvements in health outcomes throughout life that affect dementia risk.

The research team built on their previous work for the Lancet Commission on dementia prevention, intervention, and care, published in 2017, which found that 35% of dementia is attributable to nine risk factors: low levels of childhood education, hearing loss, smoking, hypertension, obesity, physical inactivity, social isolation, depression, and diabetes.*

To understand whether the commission’s findings would apply equally to global regions that were underrepresented in the report, a team of UCL researchers sought out data from China, India and Latin America. They drew from the research collective 10/66 Dementia Research Group’s data, which used similar methodology to gauge prevalence of the nine risk factors in those countries, with sample sizes of 1,000 to 3,000 in each country.

The researchers found even more potential for preventing dementia across the globe, as the proportion of dementia linked to the nine modifiable risk factors was 40% in China, 41% in India and 56% in Latin America.

A major factor in that difference is the lower levels of educational attainment in low- to middle-income countries, which the researchers say signals hope for the future, as education levels rise.

“People growing up in Asia and Latin America today are more likely to have completed schooling than their parents and grandparents were, meaning they should be less at risk of dementia later in life than people who are already over 65. Continuing to improve access to education could reap great benefits for dementia rates in years to come,” Dr Mukadam said.

On the other hand, social isolation is a major risk factor of dementia in higher income countries, but much less so in China and Latin America. The researchers say that public health officials in countries such as the UK could learn from China and Latin America in efforts to build more connected communities to buffer against the dementia risk tied to social isolation.

Obesity and hearing loss in mid-life, and physical activity in later life, were also strongly linked to dementia risk in the study area, as well as mid-life hypertension in China and Latin America and smoking in later-life in India.

“Reducing the prevalence of all of these risk factors clearly has numerous health benefits, so here we’ve identified an added incentive to support public health interventions that could also reduce dementia rates. The growing global health burden of dementia is an urgent priority, so anything that could reduce dementia risk could have immense social and economic benefit,” Dr Mukadam said.

Senior author Professor Gill Livingston (UCL Psychiatry) added: “A lot of the findings of health and medical research derive primarily from higher income countries such as in Western Europe and North America, so ensuring that research is inclusive is vital to the development of global public health strategies.”

“While we don’t expect these risk factors to be eliminated entirely, even modest improvements could have immense impact on dementia rates. Delaying the onset of dementia by just five years would halve its prevalence*,” she said.

The researchers are supported by the National Institute for Health Research UCLH Biomedical Research Centre, Wellcome, NIHR, Economic and Social Research Council, and NIHR Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care North Thames.

Most older people want to stay at home as long as they can. When this is no longer possible, they move into residential aged care facilities, which become their home. But Australia’s care facilities for the aged are growing in size and becoming less home-like.

Today, more than 200,000 Australians live or stay in residential aged care on any given day. There are around 2,672 such facilities in Australia. This equates to an average of around 75 beds per facility.

Large institutions for people with disability and mental illness, as well as orphaned children, were once commonplace. But now – influenced by the 1960s deinstitutionalisation movement – these have been closed down and replaced with smaller community-based services. In the case of aged care, Australia has gone the opposite way.

Why is smaller better?

Evidence shows that aged care residents have better well-being when given opportunities for self-determination and independence. Internationally, there has been a move towards smaller living units where the design encourages this. These facilities feel more like a home than a hospital.

The World Health Organisation has indicated that such models of care, where residents are also involved in running the facility, have advantages for older people, families, volunteers and care workers, and improve the quality of care.

Older people have a better quality of life if they can be involved in outdoor activities.from shutterstock.com

Around 50% of residents living in aged care facilities have dementia. And research has shown that a higher quality of life for those with dementia is associated with buildings that help them engage with a variety of activities both inside and outside, are familiar, provide a variety of private and community spaces and the amenities and opportunities to take part in domestic activities.

In June 2018, an Australian study found residents with dementia in aged-care facilities that provided a home-like model of care had far better quality of life and fewer hospitalisations than those in more standard facilities. The home-like facilities had up to 15 residents.

The study also found the cost of caring for older people in the smaller facilities was no higher, and in some cases lower, than in institutionalised facilities.

There are some moves in Australia towards smaller aged care services. For example, aged care provider Wintringham has developed services with smaller facilities for older people who are homeless. Wintringham received the Building and Social Housing Foundation World Habitat Award 1997 for Wintringham Port Melbourne Hostel. Its innovative design actively worked against the institutional model.

Bigger and less home-like

Historically, nursing homes in Australia were small facilities, with around 30 beds each, often run as family businesses or provided by not-for-profit organisations. Between 2002 and 2013 the proportion of facilities with more than 60 beds doubled to 48.6%. Financial viability rather than quality of care drove the increase in size.

Today, around 45% of facilities are operated by the private for-profit sector, 40% by religious and charitable organisations, 13% by community-based organisations, 3% by state and territory governments, and less than 1% by local governments.

In 2016, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) reported that residential care services run by government organisations were more likely to be in small facilities. One-fifth (22%) of places in these facilities are in services with 20 or fewer places. Almost half (49%) of privately-run residential places are found in services with more than 100 places.

All of this means that more older Australians are living out their last days in an institutional environment.

Once larger facilities become the norm, it will be difficult to undo. Capital infrastructure is built to have an average 40-year life, which will lock in the institutional model of aged care.

The built environment matters. The royal commission provides an opportunity to fundamentally critique the institutional model.

Dementia is a cruel disease that robs people of their memory, their judgement and their identity. Unfortunately, there is no cure, and in the past few years a number of clinical trials for new dementia drugs have failed – the latest being Biogen’s drug aducanumab. Without any effective treatments on the horizon, most people’s best hope is to avoid getting dementia in the first place.

One of the hallmarks of dementia is cognitive decline. There are several lifestyle changes that may slow cognitive decline, such as doing mentally stimulating activities (crossword puzzles, learning a new language), getting plenty of exercise and maintaining a healthy diet – especially one low in saturated fats, refined carbohydrates and sugar.

Of these, diet is a favourite among health reporters, perhaps because the message can be delivered clearly and succinctly. The latest such story comes from the Daily Mirror which claims that eating just two teaspoons of nuts a day “boosts brain function by 60%”. If the claim is true, we should all be rushing out to buy a bag of nuts, but is this what the study actually says?

The article is based on an observational study published in the Journal of Nutrition Health and Aging. After assessing the diets of nearly 5,000 adults in China (aged 55 and older) over a period of nine years, the researchers found an inverse relationship between the amount of nuts people ate and the degree of cognitive decline they experienced. Those who consumed more than 10g of nuts and seeds a day were less likely to show a fall in their cognitive function compared with those who consumed less than 10g a day.

Out of the 4,822 participants in the study, 67% had their cognitive ability tested twice (only 16% were tested more than twice over the course of the study). Where more than one cognitive measurement was made, cognitive performance decreased over time, but people who ate more than 10g of nuts per day decreased the likelihood of this decline. Consequently, the results suggest that consuming two teaspoons of nuts per day may preserve cognitive performance and may lead to better cognitive ageing over a lifetime. The results do not show that eating nuts improves cognitive function, as the Mirror headline claimed.

Limitations

Participants in the study inevitably varied on a number of factors, including education, general health, nutritional intake and lifestyle factors, such as exercise. Although the way the data was analysed took those factors into account and still found an association, cognitive decline and dementia are strongly influenced by many environmental and genetic factors, and it is unlikely that consumption of one particular food is sufficient to ward off dementia.

Another weakness of this study is the fact that participants reported their nut consumption via a questionnaire. Evidence shows that self-reported food consumption should always be interpreted with caution.

Although randomised controlled trials indicate that eating nuts has an effect on blood flow (including to the brain), there isn’t enough evidence to draw conclusions about their impact on cognitive function.

What we can say at this point is that the evidence on nuts and cognitive decline is promising, but it isn’t strong enough to make nutritional recommendations. Simply consuming two teaspoons of nuts per day is unlikely to reduce your risk of dementia.

News Release
April 2019 | University of Pennsylvania – Empathy and cooperation go hand in hand

Taking a game theory approach to study cooperation, School of Arts and Sciences evolutionary biologists find that empathy can help cooperative behavior ‘win out’ over selfishness.

It’s a big part of what makes us human: we cooperate. But humans aren’t saints. Most of us are more likely to help someone we consider good than someone we consider a jerk.

Taking the perspective of another can help foster cooperation in a group, according to a new study by Penn evolutionary biologists.

How we form these moral assessments of others has a lot to do with cultural and social norms, as well as our capacity for empathy, the extent to which we can take on the perspective of another person.

In a new analysis, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania investigate cooperation with an evolutionary approach. Using game-theory-driven models, they show that a capacity for empathy fosters cooperation, according to senior author Joshua Plotkin, an evolutionary biologist. The models also show that the extent to which empathy promotes cooperation depends on a given society’s system for moral evaluation.

“Having not just the capacity but the willingness to take into account someone else’s perspective when forming moral judgments tends to promote cooperation,” says Plotkin.

What’s more, the group’s analysis points to a heartening conclusion. All else being equal, empathy tends to spread throughout a population under most scenarios.

“We asked, ‘can empathy evolve?’” explains Arunas Radzvilavicius, the study’s lead author and a postdoctoral researcher who works with Plotkin. “What if individuals start copying the empathetic way of observing each other’s interactions? And we saw that empathy soared through the population.”

Plenty of scientists have probed the question of why individuals cooperate through indirect reciprocity, a scenario in which one person helps another not because of a direct quid pro quo but because they know that person to be “good.” But the Penn group gave the study a nuance that others had not explored. Whereas other studies have assumed that reputations are universally known, Plotkin, Radzvilavicius, and Stewart realized this did not realistically describe human society, where individuals may differ in their opinion of others’ reputations.

“In large, modern societies, people disagree a lot about each other’s moral reputations,” Plotkin says.

The researchers incorporated this variation in opinions into their models, which imagine someone choosing either to donate or not to donate to a second person based on that individual’s reputation. The researchers found that cooperation was less likely to be sustained when people disagree about each other’s reputations.

That’s when they decided to incorporate empathy, or theory of mind, which, in the context of the study, entails the ability to understand the perspective of another person.

Doing so allowed cooperation to win out over more selfish strategies.

“It makes a lot of sense,” Plotkin says. “If I don’t account for your point of view, there will be many occasions when I judge you harshly when I really shouldn’t because, from your perspective, you were doing the right thing.”

To further explore the impact of empathy on cooperation, the researchers looked at a variety of frameworks, or social norms, that people might use to assign a reputation to another person based on their behavior. For example, most frameworks label someone “good” if they reward a fellow “good” individual, but social norms differ in how they judge interactions with a person deemed bad. While the “stern judging” norm labels “good” anyone who punishes a bad actor, the “simple standing” norm does not require this punitive approach: A “good” person can reward a bad one.

Plotkin, Radzvilavicius, and Stewart discovered again that capacity for empathy mattered. When populations were empathetic, stern judging was the best at promoting cooperation. But when a group was less willing to take on the perspective of another, other norms maximized rates of cooperation.

This result prompted the team to ask another evolutionary question—whether empathy itself can evolve and become stable in a population. And under most scenarios, the answer was yes.

“Starting with a population where no one is empathetic, with people judging each other based on their own perspective, we saw that eventually individuals will copy the behavior of those who judge empathetically,” says Plotkin. “Empathy will spread, and cooperation can emerge.”

This was the case even when the researchers accounted for a degree of errors, noise, and misperception in their models.

The findings open up a new area of research for both evolutionary theory and empirical studies into how societies behave.

“Empathy is completely foreign to game theory,” Radzvilavicius say. “In a way this is finding a new niche for research to progress to in the future, accounting for theory of mind.”

Looking ahead, the Penn team hopes to pursue such questions, perhaps by pitting different social norms against one another and eventually by testing their ideas against observations from real people, either through experiments they design or through data collected from social media.

“It’s obvious that in social media people are acutely aware of their public persona and reputation and curate it carefully,” Plotkin says. “It would be fascinating to analyze these evolutionary dynamics as they play out in online interactions.”

Reston, VA—Researchers have discovered a way to better predict progression of Alzheimer’s disease. By imaging microglial activation levels with positron emission tomography (PET), researchers were able to better predict progression of the disease than with beta-amyloid PET imaging, according to a study published in the April issue of The Journal of Nuclear Medicine.

According to the Alzheimer’s Association, an estimated 5.3 million Americans are currently living with Alzheimer’s disease. By 2025, that number is expected to increase to more than seven million. The hallmark brain changes for those with Alzheimer’s disease include the accumulation of beta-amyloid plaques. When microglial cells from the central nervous system recognize the presence of beta-amyloid plaques, they produce an inflammatory reaction in the brain.

“The 18-kD translocator protein (TSPO) is highly expressed in activated microglia, which makes it a valuable biomarker to assess inflammation in the brain,” said Matthias Brendel, MD, MHBA, at Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich in Germany. “In our study, we utilized TSPO-PET imaging to determine whether microglial activation had any influence on cognitive outcomes in an amyloid mouse model.”

In the study, researchers compiled a series of PET images for 10 transgenic mice with beta-amyloid proteins and seven wild-type mice. TSPO PET imaging of activated microglia was conducted at eight, 9.5, 11.5 and 13 months, and beta-amyloid PET imaging was performed at eight and 13 months. Upon completion of the imaging, researchers then subjected the mice to a water maze in which the mice were to distinguish between a floating platform that would hold their weight and one that would sink. The tasks were performed several times a day during a 1.5-week period. Memory performance in the water maze was assessed by measuring the average travel time from the start point to a platform each day of training and by calculating the traveled distance at the last day of training. After completing the water maze task, immunohistochemistry analyses were performed for microglia, amyloid and synaptic density.

Transgenic mice with the highest TSPO PET signal in the forebrain or other areas associated with spatial learning tended to have better cognitive performance in the water maze, while beta-amyloid signals in the same areas of the brain showed no correlation to cognitive outcomes in the maze. Researchers found that an earlier microglial response to amyloid pathology in transgenic mice also protected synaptic density at follow-up. Specifically, transgenic mice with higher TSPO expression at eight months had much better cognitive outcomes in the water maze and higher synaptic density as confirmed by immunochemistry analyses.

“This study provides the first evidence that the level of microglial activation could be a far better predictor of current and future cognitive performance than beta-amyloid levels,” noted Brendel. “Keeping the limitations of mouse models in mind, it could be crucial to modify an individual’s microglial activation state to ameliorate future cognitive decline. We believe that a balanced microglia activation is crucial for prevention of cognitive impairment.”

For more information or to schedule an interview with the researchers, please contact Rebecca Maxey at (703) 652-6772 or rmaxey@snmmi.org. Current and past issues of The Journal of Nuclear Medicine can be found online at http://jnm.snmjournals.org.

About the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging

The Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging (SNMMI) is an international scientific and medical organization dedicated to advancing nuclear medicine and molecular imaging, vital elements of precision medicine that allow diagnosis and treatment to be tailored to individual patients in order to achieve the best possible outcomes.

SNMMI’s more than 17,000 members set the standard for molecular imaging and nuclear medicine practice by creating guidelines, sharing information through journals and meetings, and leading advocacy on key issues that affect molecular imaging and therapy research and practice. For more information, visit www.snmmi.org.

Some say they will make plans “when the need arises”. But what if you have a heart attack, go into a coma, have a stroke, or develop dementia before having shared your thoughts? We’re all ageing and none of us knows when our health will deteriorate to the point where we need daily domestic or medical assistance.

In the absence of clear instructions, you may instead be admitted into a hospital or aged care facility. That’s where most Australians aged 65 and over end up dying.

Think about how you will pay for home and aged care services, and whom you might rely on to be your advocate or carer.

Communicate your decisions (verbally and in writing) in as much detail as possible to those who need to know, such as future carers and health providers. This removes much of the guesswork later.

Relying on government-funded services is risky

Government-funded home care packages are intended to keep people in their homes for as long as possible. They provide supplementary support such as cleaning or shopping services, home visits by nurses and, in some cases, equipment to help with mobility or minor home modifications.

But while demand for these services is increasing, staffing and funding levels aren’t keeping up. Older Australians wait, on average, 18-24 months to access a home care package. In the meantime, many people are forced to move into residential care.

Many older Australians want to stay in their homes for as long as possible.Elien Dumon

It’s also important to note that Australia’s aged care system is increasingly moving to a “user pays” model, whereby aged care clients are means-tested and expected to contribute financially to their care.

So it’s unwise to assume government funding will be sufficient to pay for your aged care services.

Attitudes to residential aged care

Aged care horror stories abound in the media, especially now the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety is underway. Unfortunately, equal media coverage is not afforded to the many excellent aged care facilities in Australia.

The royal commission reported some Australians would rather die than live in residential aged care. But there is scarcely any research into public perceptions of residential aged care and whether they change over time.

In my own research, such attitudes resulted from exposure to negative media coverage, visiting residential aged care facilities, or working in aged care. Of particular concern were issues typical of institutional living – lack of privacy, personal choice or control. This was a particular issue for partnered residents, who represent one-third of aged care residents.

However, simply making a pronouncement that you reject residential care is not sufficient to prevent it happening. Entry into residential care usually happens in response to a crisis, either because people live alone or because family carers can no longer cope. The most common trigger is dementia.

Besides residential aged care, your other options include living independently with or without voluntary family or community support, a home care package and/or self-funded care. However, every scenario requires that you prepare in advance as follows.

Maintaining social connections and learning can decrease your risk of dementia.Val Vesa

Preparing for the end of your life

On an individual level, there are five important things you can do for yourself.

1. Adopt a healthy lifestyle

Learn about dementia, which is preventable in one-third of cases. Make lifestyle changes to reduce this and other diseases of old age. Maintaining social connections, getting regular exercise, lifelong learning, quitting smoking, losing weight, treating depression and even correcting for hearing loss all make a significant difference.

Early in your working life, plan your retirement income to last to 90 years of age and beyond. Aim to be debt-free and factor in costs associated with home care.

Assume you’ll be one of the 62% of people over 85 who needs residential aged care in their final years and budget accordingly. For this, you will need a bond of A$300,000 to A$500,000 minimum. Except in the lowest socioeconomic groups (who are exempted from bonds), insufficient bond money means many people, especially if they’re partnered, will not be able to afford residential aged care.

3. Talk about your wishes

First consider your preferences: where you want to die, who cares for you and what provisions you are likely to need. Then make your wishes widely known, especially to anyone you’d like to have care for you.

Choose representatives who will willingly act as advocates on your behalf, to ensure your wishes will be carried out. Advance care planning is especially important if you do not want medical intervention to keep you alive.

5. Choose carefully where you live

Consider the suitability of your home and suburb if walking becomes difficult and driving is no longer an option. Are you near a hospital? Can you reach it by public transport? Can you walk to the shops? Is your garden high-maintenance? Are friends and family nearby? Are there services available that could come to your home? Move before you need to.

Support (and be supported by) your community

Ageing is a whole-of-community issue – it affects us all. We cannot expect individuals to be solely responsible for their care.

In the past, caring for older people in their final years was routinely carried out by families and communities. This is still the best strategy. But it relies on communities forming volunteer groups to actively care for their older people.

Alison Rahn, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences, University of New England; Senior Research Officer, School of Social Sciences & Psychology, Western Sydney University

Reading up on all the news, reports and discussions on the aged care royal commission, it makes me wonder if personhood is forgotten in dementia care. Recognition, respect and trust is not rocket science and that’s just common sense. What’s happened to aged care? Why is it that people living with dementia are now being objectified, disrespected and feared in aged care. How did we go so wrong?